So many new phones have hit the market recently that we've just about seen it all. Until that next big new tech comes along, what can you possibly do to a phone that really makes it stand out? Say 'new smart phone,' and anyone in earshot thinks: Bluetooth, GPS, Wi-Fi, built-in sensors, and a full range of apps. The mere notion of a 1 GHz Snapdragon processor was once exhilarating. Now, it barely registers. And what of all these new phones hitting the market for the holidays? How many times can you spin the same configuration? Yep, you can't surprise us.

That's what we though at least until news of the all-new Samsung Continuum leaked. What Samsung has done to distinguish the Continuum is give it a second OLED screen that operates as a ticker; think stock ticker or ESPN ticker. As soon as the device is held, that portion will be turned on automatically. The rest of the power-consuming features remain turned off. While on, the ticker constantly streams information: RSS, twits, stock information, sport scores, you name it. You decide what it streams. It's so useful and not particularly groundbreaking that we had one of those moments: Why hadn't we thought of this?

One "problem" with this new face design is that it calls for very specific accessories. Universal accessories for those dimensions won't work because they'll simply cover up the second OLED window. So then, you'll have to factor a new case and a screen protector into the cost. That is a small price to pay as far as we are concerned.

Hardware wise, the Continuum boasts a 1 GHz Hummingbird CPU, 348 MB of RAM, 512 MB of ROM, 2 GB of on-board flash storage, and a preloaded 8 GB microSD card. The main display is a 3.4-inch screen with a 480 by 800 resolution. The secondary display uses a 1.8-inch screen with a 96 by 480 resolution. The 5-megapixel camera also uses an LED flash that records video at 720p. The smart phone runs off of the Android 2.1, has 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, 3G mobile, and it serves as a hotspot for up to five devices.

The main downside is that it uses Bing search and doesn't ship with Android 2.2 Froyo, but we won't stress that until we get closer to the release. By then, we should get word from Samsung, and we'd expect an update from to 2.1 to 2.2 to be available at some point. As for the exact pricing of the phone, it seems like we're going to have to wait a little bit longer, but we should have it by the end of the second week in November after the big Samsung event.